They all say that confidence comes from within. But what happens when you don’t have any? What happens if you are so lost in self doubt, that you become blind to the facts right in front of you? Sometimes, we just need a little guidance. Sometimes, all you need is a little push in the right direction.
I’m almost 100% sure that we are not confident all the time. Even if we are talented and gifted at something, doubt can be casted into our minds. Undiscovered talent is daunting, especially when you do not believe so yourself. No matter what people say, no matter what the evidence is, you just don’t see.
When I was in 6th grade, my language arts teacher told us to write a poem that consisted of onomatopoeia, alliteration, personification, etc. The best poems, she said, will get published among a collection called the Pine Tree Poetry collection and A Celebration of Young Poets. I did not even believe I could come close to doing this. Even though I saw with my own eyes that my poems were published, I thought that it was luck. It doesn’t matter if mine got published. They had probably made a mistake by listing my name among these talented people.
Fast forward to 2010. My English teacher had us do an assignment, which was to describe what we have learned so far throughout middle school. On top of that, she said that she would pick which ones she thought were the best, and mark them. However, there was a catch: to obtain the best possible grade, you had to read your essay in front of the whole school. Being ambitious, I wrote from one of her prompts. At that time, I wasn’t even thinking about being the best. Imagine my astonishment when I got my paper back, and there was a remarkably huge star in the top right corner!
Even though these events happened to me, even though my family and friends claim that I have talent, I did not believe them. Who knows, they could be biased! Is my writing really that impressive? No way! Well, everything changed when I took a Creative Writing class.
I was so excited! I love creative writing! And on top of that, the professor that teaches the class thought my work was good! Okay, back up a sec. Did he just say that your writing is good? Holy crap! A professor! Someone who is so accomplished, who published books, someone who I want to be when I grow up, admires MY work? Someone who I look up to? Someone who did incredible amounts of research, and endured the hardship through all the schooling?! It can’t be! At first, I thought he was mistaken. Surely, I’m just a student. My abilities are nowhere as good as a professor’s. But to think that he thought my work was great was phenomenal. But he kept on reinforcing it, and that made all the difference in the world. That, was when I finally started to believe.